Our Boy

Having to make this blog private is kind of bitter sweet. I am totally bummed out I can't share it with all the people who have followed Anton's story for so long but I am so excited I can now post pictures since it's private. With that being said PLEASE NEVER NEVER take any content off this blog and post it anywhere else.

This is Anton somewhere between eight and ten months old. This is when he was in the first hospital. They didn't know how to care for him so they swaddled him all day and as far as we know never really interacted with him. He had pneumonia several times and the doctors have said they don't know how he survived. What amazes me it despite all that he is still smiling.

This is Anton around 11 months. He had been transferred to a different hospital where they love him and take amazing care of him. He has a nanny that lives at the hospital with him and all the staff really care about him. They are all super excited that he is coming home to us but are also really going to miss him.

Here he is at about 19 months old. He is doing so good and is getting so big. I long for the day when I get to hold our boy and kiss those cheeks!

Our dossier is in Anton's country and is translated but the Ministry of Education is still closed down and we can't move forward until they reopen. It was getting really hard to wait not knowing why the Ministry of Education was closed down and not really knowing how long they were going to be closed I was getting super frustrated but then I was reading the Book Respectable Sins (confronting the sins we tolerate) and it said this "If I complain about the difficult circumstances of my life, I impugn the sovereignty and goodness of God and tempt my listener to do the same." I was so convicted by this statement. I will say all day long that God is sovereign and I trust Him but when it comes down to it if I am complaining and saying I want to be in Anton's country NOW and I wont be happy until that happens then I am not trusting that God is sovereign. I am wanting my way and my way now. I have repented for doing this and I pray you will forgive me if by my complaining I have cause you to doubt the goodness or sovereignty of God.

If you don't mind praying for us we would love that. Please be praying that we would glorify God through this process and that in His perfect timing we would be able to go get our boy.


Trust in the LORD with all your heart
         And do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge Him,
         And He will make your paths straight.
Proverbs 3:5-6

Dear Anton

I had the opportunity to write a letter for Anton and have it translated into his language and send it with a volunteer. I was so excited about sending a note to him and expressing our love for him but I had a really hard time trying to figure out the wording. Eastern Europe wont consider us committed to him until after we meet him for the first time and we sign paperwork saying we are committed to him. So I couldn't figure out how to word the letter. I didn't know if I should say hi I'm Vanessa and my family loves you very much and..... I couldn't really figure out how to word it with out saying too much so I decided not to do it. But after I saw the video on Anton's FB page of him sitting up all by himself I knew I had to start writing letters to him on here because I have so much I want him to know.

So here goes...

Sweet Baby Anton,

There is so much I want you to know so much I want to say I am not sure where to start so I will start at the beginning. Jason and I have always wanted to adopt we have talked about it since the beginning of our marriage but weren't really sure when we should start. We knew after having Judah that he would be our last biological child and we would adopt all of our future children. We were so excited to start the process to adopt but again we really didn't know when we should start.

The Lord allowed us to be blessed with conjoined twin daughters on November 11th 2008 and it was during my pregnancy with them that I began to develop a HUGE heart for kids with special medical needs. I was hoping we would be able to adopt a child with special medical needs because I truly knew what a huge blessing all children are.

I had thought maybe we should wait until Judah was 2 to start the process to adopt but a few days before I found out about you I started really wanting to adopt right away. I kept thinking "no we should wait" then I would think "no I really want to start now." These feelings of wanting to adopt soon only increased as the days went on. Then on February 8th I clicked on my friend Kristy's FaceBook page and she had posted a link to your story and it was love at first sight. The more I read your story the more I fell in love. It is so hard to explain but I knew you were supposed to be our son and we needed to do whatever we could to bring you home!

I had about 30 minutes to wait until my husband got off of work to tell him all that I had just discovered. I prayed and prayed for Jason that if this was the Lord's will God would prepare his heart and he would be just as excited as I was. It finally came time to call him. I started telling Jason your story and I was brought to tears more than once telling him about your first year of life. After I got through telling him all about you and my desire to adopt you I said "so what do you think?" He said "we are all for adoption let's go for it." I was so excited!

I got off the phone with him and called Kristy right away to tell her that it is was our desire to be your forever family. She didn't answer but called me back about ten minutes later. I told her how much I loved you and how much we wanted you and she said "Vanessa I just got chills. I was rocking Hope to sleep when you called and I was praying asking the Lord if it was His will for us to adopt Anton would He please show us and if not would he please close the door." I thought that was so amazing! She told me about Patrice (Jonah's Mom) and how she was wanting to help raise money for Anton's adoption. I couldn't believe all the support we had so quickly.

I got off the phone with her and started contacting the volunteers who were working so hard to find you a family. I started calling adoption agency's and home study agency's and working for hours and hours a day trying to get moving on your adoption.

I have never doubted for one second from the moment we found you that you are supposed to be our son and Lord willing one day (hopefully very soon) we will be able to officially say you are a Delgado.

I can not wait for the moment I get to hold you in my arms and tell you I am your Momma! I love you more then you will ever know and I want you to know we are working as hard and as fast as we can to bring you home.

I love you sweet boy and I am so excited to see how well you are doing through your FaceBook page!

Love your soon to be Momma!

Vanessa

What's Next?

Now that we have PASSED our home study we have a lot of paper work to do. The country we are adopting from is now requiring a psychologist evaluation to be included in the home study which our social worker found out about the day before our home study. We went ahead and did the home study knowing it couldn't be completed until we had our evaluations done. Our social worker is almost finished with the draft for our home study but she wont be able to finish our home study until we get our evaluations. I am trying to get that scheduled asap!

After our home study is complete then we will send that and our USCIS (immigration) paperwork to... well the place you send the USCIS paper :) That takes about 3 months to get back. I will be calling them often trying to get that part going as fast as we can. While we are waiting for that to be done we will be working on our Dossier. The Dossier is tons and tons of paperwork that will need to be filled out. Once that's done and we get our USCIS approval then our adoption agency sends our home study, dossier, and USCIS over to Eastern Europe and we wait for and invitation to travel to the country and meet ANTON! We will be there for about ten days that trip and that is when we will get to officially commit to his adoption (we are officially committed in America). Then we have to come back home for two or three months and wait for our final court date. When we go back the second time we will go for about two and a half weeks. We will go to court and officially adopt him then bring him home 10 days later. It is going to be so hard to go meet him on that first trip and spend time with him then come home without him but I know this is all part of the process. We love Anton and can't wait to bring him home no matter how long that take.

A few people were asking if we were covered as far as bandages go once we bring him home and I am so excited to say we are. There is an organization that will be providing us with everything we need until our insurance adds him to our policy. Praise God for this!

Anton is doing really well. He is gaining weight and he loves his baths which is amazing because it can be very painful for some people with EB. There is a new update on his Help Anton FB page if you want to read more about how he is doing. That is also where I get the pictures of Anton from.

We love this baby soooooo much and we can't wait to bring him home. The whole process could take anywhere from six months to a year but we are praying if it is the Lord's will that we can bring him home as soon as possible.

Don't forget to check out The Hope For Anton Blog to see what's up for bid or if you were wanting to make a donation with out biding on something you can click on his picture on the right side of this blog and donate directly through his Reece's Rainbow page but I will say the bidding is fun and you can get your Christmas shopping done early. Reece's Rainbow's server is having a hard time with all the traffic it's been getting lately so if the link is not working you can try back later.

Thank you guys so much for the support and donations we are so thankful for the work God is doing in our lives!

How cute is Anton with baby food on his face!?! He is getting so big!

Lots to do...

Hi everyone I just wanted to stop in really quick and say I made it home safely and I am crazy busy :)

Jason and I just completed three and a half hours of adoption training online and we are about to go for one more hour. We have learned a lot and we look forward to learning more.

I had an AMAZING time with the Williams' Family and I miss them so much. I told Patrice they should more here but she keeps saying something about how they have beaches and mountains blah what are beaches and mountains compared to the joys of living close to us haha :) I'm kidding of course... well kind of.

I have a lot of paperwork to get together before our home study and I have a few more things to do to get our house ready so I might not blog very much over these next few days.

Our home study is officially scheduled for Saturday at 9am!!!!

I will try to keep y'all updated. I can not tell you guys thank you enough for all the prayers and support! God is so faithful and it has been so neat to watch everything coming together!

I leave you with a few amazing blogs to read. The first one was written by Kristy titled Little People Big Difference and it is about Kristy, Patrice and my children who are alive (including our sweet boy Anton) and the ones that are with Jesus it is so sweet and you will not regret reading it HERE.

The other one was written by Patrice and it is the full story of how she found Anton and how I later found him on my friend Kristy's FB page click HERE to read it.

The last thing I will leave you with is the link to the Hope for Anton blog there are some really neat fundraisers going on over there right now so hurry before you miss them :)

Answers about fundraising

Hi again! Today has been a really fun day! I spent the day taking step by step pictures of all things Jonah :) diaper changes, getting dressed and undressed, bath, dressing change, before bed routine. I am feeling more and more prepared to care of Anton's EB. I know a lot of it we will have to wait until he is home to see exactly what his skin can and can not handle but I think we have a GREAT starting point thanks to the William's Family!

A few people have asked me if we are still raising support for the adoption and the answer is YES! You can still donate directly on Anton's Reece's Rainbow page when you click on the link you will notice he has two profiles on Reece's Rainbow one has our family information beside it the other has his story beside it. One of them has more money than the other but I wanted y'all to know that all of the money from both of those places will go toward the costs associated with Anton's adoption. So don't worry if you gave and it is not on the new page it is still on the old one and we for sure be able to use it. Reece's Rainbow also made us a Pay Pal button for our blog and that will go directly to his account through Reece's Rainbow. I just haven't had a chance to put that up yet.

There is another really cool way to donate and that is on the Hope for Anton Blog. Patrice Williams (my friend I am staying with) found out about Anton through the EB community around the end of 2010. She has a HUGE heart for Anton and wasn't sure if God was calling their family to adopt him. They soon realized that God was not calling them to adopt Anton but she knew she wanted to help this sweet baby find a home. It was at that time Patrice decided to start doing fundraising for Anton's adoption it was around the same time that Recce's Rainbow added him to their page. Patrice wrote a VERY detailed blog about how she found Anton and how I then found him through a mutual friend Kristy. You can check out that post HERE! If you want to give towards Anton's adoption make sure you check out the Hope for Anton Blog and see if there anything on there you want to bid on or buy.

It is my desire to update this blog as often as possible because I truly want you guys to know where we are in this process. I know there are so many people that love Anton and are praying for him and I want you all to know we appreciate it so much!

Sweet little Anton I just wanted you to know that we love you very much and we are working as hard and as fast as we can to bring you home!

Vanessa

Anton has found his forever family... AND IT'S US!!!!

I would like to introduce you to the newest member of our family

Anton!

We love Anton so much and can't wait to bring him home. I'm not exactly sure the timeline of everything but as soon as I know I will post it. We are soooooo excited and look forward to the day we get to kiss our Anton's sweet cheeks!

http://reecesrainbow.org/sponsordelgado

Please make sure in sharing Anton's story you do not post what country he is from. You can say Eastern Europe but not the country.

Thanks